90 Best Malcolm Gladwell Quotes from “Outliers” & “David And Goliath”

If you are searching for motivational Malcolm Gladwell Quotes from his books: “Outliers” and latest book “David and Goliath” about success, leadership for inspiration. read this blog for ideas.

What is Malcolm Gladwell best known for?

Malcolm Gladwell is a Canadian best-selling author, journalist, motivational speaker, and host of a podcast ‘Revisionist History.’

He has been a staff writer at The New Yorker since 1996. Before that,

he was a reporter at the Washington Post. He is also author of Blink, The Tipping Point and Outliers.

Malcolm Gladwell was born on 3 September 1963 in England. He is well-known for his unique perspective on achieving success with a practical outlook.

10 facts about Malcolm Gladwell.

  1. All of Malcolm Gladwell’s books have been non-fiction and New York Times Bestsellers. He has extensively used modern research to conclude social life and issues. 
  2. His first book The Tipping Point explored the reason behind the reduced crime rate in New York. It was named as one of the best non-fiction books of the decade by amazon.com 
  3. His second book Blink was again an international hit. He talked about the idea of humans making informed decisions based on past experiences in life. 
  4. In Outliers, which came out in 2008, Malcolm Gladwell examined the reasons behind a person’s success. How a person’s environment, determination & motivation can make him successful, even if he is not very smart. 
  5. What the dog saw explores the world through a dog’s eyes and features a collection of articles Gladwell wrote for the New Yorker. 
  6. His fifth book David & Goliath was financially successful, but reviews from critics were not as favourable as the other books. 
  7. In 2005, he was named as one of the Top 100 influential people by the Time Magazine.
  8. For his work in reporting on the social issues, Malcolm Gladwell was awarded by the American Sociologist Association in 2007.
  9. Malcolm Gladwell has remained a lone wolf when it comes to marriage. He has no children. 
  10. Born in a Christian family, Malcolm Gladwell gave up his beliefs when working in New York. However, while writing one of his novels David & Goliath, he claims to have rediscovered his faith in Christianity.

Find him on social media Instagram, twitter,

Also read famous people success and motivational quotes, life stories

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So, what are you looking for? Malcolm Gladwell quotes on success, Malcolm Gladwell quotes on leadership, Malcolm Gladwell motivation, Malcolm Gladwell ‘Outliers’ Quotes, Inspirational Quotes By Malcolm Gladwell, Malcolm Gladwell Quotes On Hard Work

Malcolm Gladwell’s Outliers Quotes

Best Malcolm Gladwell Quotes From The Author Of ‘Outliers’

‘Outliers: The Story of Success’ is Gladwell’s third book, published in 2008 and proved to be popular. It deals with how a person’s circumstances and environment, talent and hard work, affect their opportunity for success. Here are some of the most inspirational quotes from ‘Outliers.’

“It is those who are successful, in other words, who are most likely to be given the kinds of special opportunities that lead to further success.”-Malcolm Gladwell. , ‘Outliers.’

“It’s not how much money we make that ultimately makes us happy between nine and five. It’s whether or not our work fulfills us. Being a teacher is meaningful.”-Malcolm Gladwell. , ‘Outliers.’

“Achievement is talent plus preparation”-Malcolm Gladwell. , ‘Outliers.’

“If you work hard enough and assert yourself, and use your mind and imagination, you can shape the world to your desires.”-Malcolm Gladwell. , ‘Outliers.’

“Practice isn’t the thing you do once you’re good. It’s the thing you do that makes you good.”-Malcolm Gladwell. , ‘Outliers.’

“Practical intelligence includes things like knowing what to say to whom, knowing when to say it, and knowing how to say it for maximum effect.”-Malcolm Gladwell. , ‘Outliers.’

“Don’t depend on heaven for food, but on your own two hands carrying the load.”-Malcolm Gladwell. , ‘Outliers.’

“The 10,000hr rule is a definite key in success.”-Malcolm Gladwell. , ‘Outliers.’

“Working really hard is what successful people do.”-Malcolm Gladwell. , ‘Outliers.’

“Success is not a random act. It arises out of a predictable and powerful set of circumstances and opportunities.”-Malcolm Gladwell. , ‘Outliers.’

“Success is the result of what sociologists like to call accumulative advantage.”-Malcolm Gladwell. , ‘Outliers.’

“Outliers are those that have been given an opportunities – and who have had the strength and presence of mind to seize them.”-Malcolm Gladwell , ‘Outliers.’

“Some pretend to be rich, yet have nothing; others pretend to be poor, yet have great wealth.” -Malcolm Gladwell, ‘Outliers.’

“Successful people don’t do it alone. Where they come from matters. They’re products of particular places and environments.”-Malcolm Gladwell, ‘Outliers.’

“Knowledge of a boy’s IQ is of little help if you are faced with a formful of clever boys.”-Malcolm Gladwell, ‘Outliers.’

Malcolm Gladwell quotes on success

“Truly successful decision-making relies on a balance between deliberate and instinctive thinking.”-Malcolm Gladwell.

“The older I get, the more I understand that the only way to say valuable things is to lose your fear of being correct.”-Malcolm Gladwell.

“We need to look at the subtle, the hidden, and the unspoken.”-Malcolm Gladwell.

“The only true way to listen is with your ears and your heart.”-Malcolm Gladwell.

“Underdog strategies are hard.”-Malcolm Gladwell.

‘Extraordinary achievement is less about talent than it is about the opportunity.’-Malcolm Gladwell.

“When we become experts in something, our tastes grow more esoteric and complex.”-Malcolm Gladwell.

“Researchers have settled on what they believe is the magic number for true expertise: ten thousand hours.” -Malcolm Gladwell.

“No one who can rise before dawn three hundred sixty days a year fails to make his family rich.” -Malcolm Gladwell.

Malcolm Gladwell motivation

“The thing that distinguishes one performer from another is how hard he or she works. That’s it. And what’s more, the people at the very top don’t work just harder or even much harder than everyone else. They work much, much harder.” -Malcolm Gladwell.

“We prematurely write off people as failures. We are too much in awe of those who succeed and far too dismissive of those who fail.” -Malcolm Gladwell.

“How you feel about your abilities – your academic ‘self-concept’- in the context of your classroom shapes your willingness to tackle challenges and finish difficult tasks. It’s a crucial element in your motivation and confidence.” -Malcolm Gladwell.

“People are ruined by challenged economic lives. But they are ruined by wealth as well because they lose their pride and they lose their sense of self-worth. It’s difficult at both ends of the spectrum.” -Malcolm Gladwell.

“Courage is not something that you already have that makes you brave when the tough times start. Courage is what you earn when you’ve been through the tough times and you discover they aren’t so tough after all.” -Malcolm Gladwell.

“There is an important principle that guides our thinking about the relationship between parenting and money – and that principle is that more is not always better.” -Malcolm Gladwell.

“We compare ourselves to those in the same situation as ourselves, which means that students in an elite school – except, perhaps, those at the very top of the class – are going to face the burden that they would not face in a less competitive atmosphere.” -Malcolm Gladwell.

“Society frowns at disagreeableness. As human beings we are hardwired to seek the approval of those around us. Yet a radical and transformative thought goes nowhere without the willingness to challenge convention. ” -Malcolm Gladwell.

“We spend a lot of time thinking about the ways that prestige and resources and belonging to elite institutions make us better off. We don’t spend enough time thinking about the ways in which those kinds of material advantages limit our options.” -Malcolm Gladwell.

“Being on the outside, in a less elite and less privileged environment, can give you more freedom to pursue your own ideas and academic interests.” -Malcolm Gladwell.

“Spontaneity isn’t random.” -Malcolm Gladwell.

Inspirational Quotes By Malcolm Gladwell

  1. “It’s not how much money we make that ultimately makes us happy between nine and five. It’s whether or not our work fulfills us. Being a teacher is meaningful.” -Malcolm Gladwell.
  2. “The values of the world we inhabit and the people we surround ourselves with have a profound effect on who we are.” -Malcolm Gladwell.
  3. “When and where you are born, what your parents did for a living, and what the circumstances of your upbringing were make a significant difference in how well you do in the world.” -Malcolm Gladwell.
  4. “It’s not so much ability as attitude.” -Malcolm Gladwell.
  5. “Those three things – autonomy, complexity, and a connection between effort and reward – are, most people will agree, the three qualities that work has to have if it is to be satisfying.” -Malcolm Gladwell.
  6. “It is not the brightest who succeed. … Nor is success simply the sum of the decisions and efforts we make on our own behalf. It is, rather, a gift. Outliers are those that have been given an opportunities – and who have had the strength and presence of mind to seize them.” -Malcolm Gladwell.
  7. “Who we are cannot be separated from where we’re from.” -Malcolm Gladwell.
  8. “But before he could become an expert, someone had to give him the opportunity to learn how to be an expert.” -Malcolm Gladwell.
  9. “Hard work is a prison sentence only if it does not have meaning. Once it does, it becomes the kind of thing that makes you grab your wife around the waist and dance a jig.” -Malcolm Gladwell.
  10. “The kinds of errors that cause plane crashes are invariably errors of teamwork and communication.” -Malcolm Gladwell.

Malcolm Gladwell Quotes On Hard Work

  1. “Our acquaintances—not our friends—are our greatest source of new ideas and information.”-Malcolm Gladwell.
  2. “In the act of tearing something apart, you lose its meaning.”-Malcolm Gladwell.
  3. The real me isn’t the person I describe, no the real me is me revealed by my actions.”-Malcolm Gladwell.
  4. “A book, I was taught long ago in English class, is a living and breathing document that grows richer with each new reading.”-Malcolm Gladwell.
  5. “When people in authority want the rest of us to behave, it matters—first and foremost—how they behave.”-Malcolm Gladwell.
  6. “My earliest memories of my father are of seeing him work at his desk and realizing that he was happy. I did not know it then, but that was one of the most precious gifts a father can give his child.”-Malcolm Gladwell.
  7. “You don’t manage a social wrong. You should be ending it.”-Malcolm Gladwell.
  8. “Some pretend to be rich, yet have nothing; others pretend to be poor, yet have great wealth.”-Malcolm Gladwell.
  9. “Emotion is contagious.”-Malcolm Gladwell.
  10. “Understanding the true nature of instinctive decision making requires us to be forgiving of those people trapped in circumstances where good judgment is imperiled.”-Malcolm Gladwell.
  11. “Courage is not something that you already have that makes you brave when the tough times start. Courage is what you earn when you’ve been through the tough times and you discover they aren’t so tough after all.”-Malcolm Gladwell.
  12. “Character is more like a bundle of habits and tendencies and interests, loosely bound together and dependent, at certain times, on circumstance and context.”-Malcolm Gladwell.
  13. “He’d had to make his way alone, and no one—not rock stars, not professional athletes, not software billionaires, and not even geniuses —ever makes it alone.”-Malcolm Gladwell.
  14. “If you want to bring a fundamental change in people’s belief and behavior…you need to create a community around them, where those new beliefs can be practiced and expressed and nurtured.”-Malcolm Gladwell.
  15. “They were not really afraid. They were just afraid of being afraid.”-Malcolm Gladwell.
  16. 9″Acquaintances, in sort, represent a source of social power, and the more acquaintances you have the more powerful you are.”-Malcolm Gladwell.
  17. “I want to convince you that these kinds of personal explanations of success don’t work.”-Malcolm Gladwell.
  18. “Whenever we have something that we are good at–something we care about–that experience and passion fundamentally changes the nature of our first impressions.”-Malcolm Gladwell.
  19. “If there is meaning to your work – work is a prison no more. It becomes joyful.”-Malcolm Gladwell.
  20. “It’s not how much money we make that ultimately makes us happy between nine and five…being a teacher is meaningful.”-Malcolm Gladwell.

Malcolm Gladwell quotes on leadership

  1. “Much of what we consider valuable in our world arises out of these kinds of lopsided conflicts, because the act of facing overwhelming odds produces greatness and beauty.”Malcolm Gladwell’s latest book David And Goliath.  
  2. “Power can come in other forms as well – in breaking rules, in substituting speed and surprise for strength.”Malcolm Gladwell’s latest book David And Goliath.  
  3. “The very thing that gave the giant his size was also the source of his greatest weakness…The powerful and the strong are not always what they seem.”Malcolm Gladwell’s latest book David And Goliath.  
  4. “Why do we automatically assume that someone who is smaller or poorer or less skilled is necessarily at a disadvantage?”Malcolm Gladwell’s latest book David And Goliath.  
  5. “The whole Redwood City (girls basketball team) philosophy was based on a willingness to try harder than anyone else.”Malcolm Gladwell’s latest book David And Goliath.  
  6. “When an underdog fought like David, he usually won.  But most underdogs don’t fight like David,”Malcolm Gladwell’s latest book David And Goliath.  
  7. “(Basketball coach Rick) Pitino has achieved extraordinary things with a fraction of the talent of his competitors.”Malcolm Gladwell’s latest book David And Goliath.  
  8. “To play by David’s rules you have to be desperate.”Malcolm Gladwell’s latest book David And Goliath.  
  9. “Why should he (Pitino) care what the world of basketball thought of him?…that gave him the freedom to try things no one else even dreamt of.”Malcolm Gladwell’s latest book David And Goliath.  
  10. “77% of Americans think that it makes more sense to use taxpayer money to lower class sizes than to raise teachers’ salaries.”Malcolm Gladwell’s latest book David And Goliath.  
  11. “Any fool can spend money.  But to earn it and save it and defer gratification – then you learn to value it differently.”Malcolm Gladwell’s latest book David And Goliath.  
  12. “It’s much harder than anybody believes to bring up kids in a wealthy environment…People are ruined by challenged economic times.  But they’re ruined by wealth as well because they lose their ambition and they lose their pride and they lose their sense of self-worth.  It’s difficult at both ends of the spectrum.”Malcolm Gladwell’s latest book David And Goliath.  
  13. “More money stops making people happier at a family income of around seventy-five thousands dollars a year.Malcolm Gladwell’s latest book David And Goliath.  
  14. “Wealth contains the seeds of its own destruction”.Malcolm Gladwell’s latest book David And Goliath.  
  15. “If you are a student – particularly a poor student – what you need is to have people around you asking the same questions…class-size reduction “steals away the peers that struggling students can learn from.”Malcolm Gladwell’s latest book David And Goliath.  
  16. “Small Ponds are welcoming places for those on the inside.  They have all the support that comes from community and friendship.”Malcolm Gladwell’s latest book David And Goliath.  
  17. “We form our impressions not globally, by placing ourselves in the broadest possible context, but locally – by comparing ourselves to people “in the same boat as ourselves.”Malcolm Gladwell’s latest book David And Goliath.  
  18. “Citizens in happy countries have higher suicide rates than citizens of unhappy countries, because they look at the smiling faces around them and the contrast is too great.”Malcolm Gladwell’s latest book David And Goliath.  
  19. “The Big Pond takes really bright students and demoralizes them…It’s the Little Pond that maximizes your chances to do whatever you want.”Malcolm Gladwell’s latest book David And Goliath.  
  20. “An extraordinary high number of successful entrepreneurs are dyslexic.”Malcolm Gladwell’s latest book David And Goliath.  
  21. “Capitalization Learning” – we get good at something by building on the strengths we are naturally given…”Compensation Learning” – what is learned out of necessity is inevitably more powerful than learning that comes easily.”Malcolm Gladwell’s latest book David And Goliath.  
  22. “An innovator who has brilliant ideas but lacks the discipline and persistence to carry them out is merely a dreamer.”Malcolm Gladwell’s latest book David And Goliath.  
  23. “A radical and transformative thought goes nowhere without the willingness to challenge convention.”Malcolm Gladwell’s latest book David And Goliath.  
  24. “Learning how to deal with the possibility of failure is really good preparation for a career in the business world.”Malcolm Gladwell’s latest book David And Goliath.  
  25. “Corpses do not run about spreading panic.”Malcolm Gladwell’s latest book David And Goliath.  
  26. “Sixty-seven percent of the prime ministers surveyed lost a parent before the age of sixteen.”Malcolm Gladwell’s latest book David And Goliath.  
  27. “Courage is not something that you already have…Courage is what you earn when you’ve been through the tough times and you discover they aren’t so tough after all.”Malcolm Gladwell’s latest book David And Goliath.  
  28. “African-Americans have spent a few hundred years learning how to cope with being outgunned and overmatched.”Malcolm Gladwell’s latest book David And Goliath.  
  29. “Fundamental to our analysis is the assumption that the population, as individuals or groups, behaves “rationally”.Malcolm Gladwell’s latest book David And Goliath.  
  30. “There comes a point where the best-intentioned application of power and authority begins to backfire.”Malcolm Gladwell’s latest book David And Goliath.  
  31. “77% of Americans think that it makes more sense to use taxpayer money to lower class sizes than to raise teachers’ salaries.” Malcolm Gladwell’s latest book David And Goliath.  

Final Thoughts on These Powerful Malcolm Gladwell Quotes

We hope you enjoyed these handful quotes of Malcolm Gladwell.

Gladwell is not just an author, he is also journalist and speaker. He constantly travels to talk with audiences around the world. His works and articles are frequently used in the fields of sociology, social psychology, and psychology.

What is the main lesson you learned from Malcolm Gladwell Quotes?

  • All of Malcolm Gladwell’s books have been non-fiction and New York Times Bestsellers. He has extensively used modern research to conclude social life and issues. 
  • His first book The Tipping Point explored the reason behind the reduced crime rate in New York. It was named as one of the best non-fiction books of the decade by amazon.com 
  • His second book Blink was again an international hit. He talked about the idea of humans making informed decisions based on past experiences in life. 
  • In Outliers, which came out in 2008, Malcolm Gladwell examined the reasons behind a person’s success. How a person’s environment, determination & motivation can make him successful, even if he is not very smart. 
  • What the dog saw explores the world through a dog’s eyes and features a collection of articles Gladwell wrote for the New Yorker. 
  • His fifth book David & Goliath was financially successful, but reviews from critics were not as favourable as the other books. 

Books Recommended byMalcolm Gladwell (MUST READ)

books recommended by Nelson Mandela.

  1. Gladwell authored six books till date: Buy On Amazon
  2. ‘The Tipping Point’ in 2000, ‘Blink’ in 2005, : Buy On Amazon
  3. ‘Outliers: The Story of Success’ in 2008, : Buy On Amazon
  4. ‘What the Dog Saw’ in 2009, : Buy On Amazon
  5. ‘David and Goliath’ in 2013, : Buy On Amazon
  6. ‘Talking To Strangers’ in 2019, : Buy On Amazon

out of which the first five became The Network Times bestsellers. Gladwell is also recognized as one of the 100 Most Influential People by TIME magazine.

The 10 Best Personal Development Books?

  1. Jonathan Livingston Seagull. By Richard Bach.
  2. Think and Grow Rich. By Napoleon Hill.
  3. Think and Grow Rich. By Napoleon Hill.
  4. Steve Jobs. By Walter Isaacson.
  5. Long Walk To Freedom. By Nelson Mandela.
  6. Stop Acting Rich. By Thomas Stanley.
  7. As You Think. By James Allen.
  8. The Magic of Thinking Big. By David Schwartz.
  9. Talent is Overrated. By Geoff Colvin.
  10. Spark. By John Ratey.

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Roshan Sharma

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